Press Releases

2016

October 6, 2016

Kurita Expands its Lineup of TELEMAC® NEO Service Contracts Pursuing Added Value for Customers from Boiler Water to Cooling Water Treatment
Two Special Clauses Guaranteeing to Save Energy and Keep Legionella Bacteria at Undetectable Levels in Refrigeration Systems

Kurita Water Industries Ltd. (Head Office: Nakano-ku, Tokyo; President: Michiya Kadota) has expanded its lineup of TELEMAC® NEO Service Contracts for boiler water treatment launched in August this year to include cooling water treatment. Kurita will draw on technologies and knowhow in the area of cooling water treatment accumulated over many years to undertake water treatment management of cooling facilities and provide a wider range of water treatment package services to pursue added value for customers, including energy saving in treatment processes and the stable operation of facilities.

The name of the newly rolled out service is Cooling Water TELEMAC NEOTM. The service will contribute to energy saiving by minimizing energy loss as a result of decline in the efficiency of refrigeration systems used in the air-conditioning and production facilities of plants and office buildings, etc., and will also reliably eliminate Legionella bacteria that cause the infection known as Legionnaires' disease. One of the features of the service is that the annual service contract includes two additional special clauses: "Guarantee to maintain refrigeration system LTD level (*1)" and "Guarantee to keep legionella bacteria at undetectable levels" (see Supplementary Materials for further details), thus guaranteeing effective water treatment for customers . Consequently, the service will help solve various problems including energy-saving operation of refrigeration systems, keep the equipment in good condition through maintenance and reduction of utility costs.

With Cooling Water TELEMAC NEOTM, Kurita builds a water treatment system suited to the customer's facilities and water quality around its groundbreaking LEG//END ®(*3) bacteria elimination technology, which keeps legionella bacteria at undetectable levels. We achieve optimization of water treatment management across all cooling facilities by combining a system that remotely monitors the quality of cooling water, chemical dosage, etc., a device that keeps the chemical concentration constant for stable effective water treatment, and technology for monitoring refrigeration system efficiency and fouling. Furthermore, to provide these products and technologies in the form of an all-inclusive contract, no initial investment is required, allowing water treatment to start immediately. Additionally, constantly maintaining effective water treatment also makes it possible to reduce the opening and cleaning frequency of refrigeration systems and curb maintenance costs.

Kurita plans to apply Cooling Water TELEMAC NEOTM in a wide range of industries both in Japan and overseas to meet a broad spectrum of customer needs for safety and security. Also, while expanding the lineup of TELEMAC NEOTM from boilers to cooling water, Kurita will seek to expand water treatment chemical business services by proposing total boiler water treatment and cooling water treatment and resolving customer issues at a whole plant level.

*1:LTD (Leaving Temperature Difference) is the difference between the condensation temperature of the refrigerant used in the refrigeration system and the coolant water temperature at its outlet, which is used to understand heat transfer efficiency (the state of attachment of fouling on the heat transfer tubes). A larger LTD value suggests that heat transfer efficiency is lower as more fouling is attached on the surface.

*2:Legionella bacteria, a species of aerobic gram-negative bacillus, are said to inhabit 40% of cooling towers that do not receive water treatment. If a person inhales droplets of water (aerosol) from a cooling tower that contains legionella bacteria, he/she may develop an infectious disease named legionellosis which takes the form of fever, headache, difficulty breathing and other symptoms.

*3:LEG//END is a registered trademark of Kurita Water Industries Co., Ltd.

（Supplementary Materials）

1.Cooling Water Treatment

Cooling water is used mainly to cool products to the right temperature in various manufacturing processes and it also has the function of improving energy efficiency through the optimal air conditioning management of entire plants. Recycling cooling water without any kind of treatment can lead to corrosion in the pipes of refrigeration systems or heat exchangers and the attachment of fouling such as slime and scale. If these factors prevent proper cooling, this can lead to a decrease in production efficiency and energy loss and can also cause significant damage to the facilities themselves.
To prevent damage to cooling water systems, generally cooling water treatment chemicals that demonstrate excellent effectiveness in reducing slime and scale or preventing corrosion are used.

(Notes)Slime: Contaminants formed by microbes such as underwater bacteria and algae
Scale: Calcium or silica solids precipitated from water

2.Outline of Special Clauses of Cooling Water TELEMAC NEOTM Contract

1）Guarantee to maintain LTD level of refrigeration system
In recent years, there has been an increase in the number of customers wanting to improve energy loss as a result of decline in the efficiency of refrigeration systems used in air-conditioning and production facilities as a means of reducing CO2 emissions at plants, office buildings, etc.. At large plants , refrigeration system operating costs sometimes account for 20~30% of energy costs.
The main cause is the attachment of fouling such as slime and scale that arises in the cooling water that flows through the refrigeration systems. Effective use of cooling water treatment chemicals can prevent the attachment of fouling to the heat exchangers of refrigeration systems and deliver energy savings in relation to cooling water operations.

＜LTD - Indicator of refrigeration system efficiency＞
LTD（Leaving Temperature Difference）is the difference between the condensation temperature of the refrigerant used in the refrigeration system and the coolant water temperature at its outlet, which is used to understand heat transfer efficiency (the state of attachment of fouling on the heat transfer tubes). A larger LTD value suggests that heat transfer efficiency is lower as more fouling such as scale and slime is attached on the surface of the tube, while a smaller LTD value suggests that there is less fouling. It is generally claimed that a 1℃ increase in the LTD value equates to a 3% rise in electric power costs.

The special clause of the Cooling Water TELEMAC NEOTM contract guarantees to maintain the LTD level of the customer's facilities through water treatment performed by Kurita, thus helping customers save energy.

2）Guarantee to keep legionella bacteria at undetectable levels
Cooling towers located in plants and buildings are at risk of circulating water becoming contaminated with propagating legionella bacteria (*). If a person inhales aerosol (misty and fine droplets) of the bacteria, he/she may contract an infectious disease named legionellosis (*). The guidelines for prevention of legionellosis, formulated by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare in Japan, advises that actions such as cleaning and disinfection should be taken immediately after legionella bacteria (100 CFU/100 mL or greater) have been detected. However, we have received strong requests from customers to develop a technique that consistently prevents the propagation of legionella bacteria (undetectable level = 100 CFU/100 mL or less) for health and safety reasons and to avoid business risk.

＜LEG//END®＞
Kurita developed LEG//END® in July 2017 as a groundbreaking bacteria elimination technique for keeping legionella bacteria in the cooling water system at undetectable levels by preventing their propagation. LEG//END® delivers a massive improvement in bacteria elimination with the combined use of a detachment agent for eliminating biofilm (an aggregate consisting of many different microbial species), which can be a hotbed for legionella bacteria, and a bacteria elimination agent for removing legionella bacteria floating in the water. (Treatment identifies the optimal combination of detachment and bacteria-elimination agents to generate synergy among the different functions and maximize the bacteria elimination effects.)

The special clause guarantees to keep legionella bacteria at undetectable levels (=100CFU/100mL or less) by creating an environment that prevents legionella bacteria from propagating through the elimination of any bacteria detected in accurate testing for legionella bacteria and subsequent use of LEG//END®.